On April 12, 2013, the Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) reached its final orbit, 705 kilometers (438 miles) above Earth. One week later, the satellite's natural-color imager scanned a swath of land 185-kilometers wide and 9,000 kilometers long (120 by 6,000 miles)—an unusual, unbroken distance considering 70 percent of Earth is covered with water. That flight path—depicted on the globe below—afforded us the chance to assemble 56 still images into a seamless, flyover view of what LDCM saw on April 19, 2013. Stretching from northern Russia to South Africa, the full mosaic from the Operational Land Imager can be viewed in this video.

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I have had a passion for photography for as long as I can remember.My father was a photographer and since a child I was delighted in how a moment can be captured through the lens of a camera, and how time stands still within the frame of a photograph. Perhaps the best gift I had ever received was my first camera. Since that my life has completely changed and I started to see world around me in rectangular shape.

Photography is not just a hobby for me or a means of earning a living. It’s a way of preserving memories and sharing experiences, an art form that should be celebrated.